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After 32-year-old Selina Mesmin gave birth to her first son, Hugo, in May 2013, she forgot to return to her doctor for her regular smear test. Mesmin figured it wasn’t a big deal, so she simply chose not to return to the doctor, even when she remembered.
The next time she finally went was in July 2014, at which point doctors discovered abnormal cells in her cervix. During the operation to remove these affected cells, doctors also discovered that Mesmin was seven weeks pregnant with her second child.
Mesmin was “ecsta[tic]” at the news – but the euphoria didn’t last long.
Six weeks later, doctors diagnosed Mesmin’s abnormal cervix cells as cancerous. Then, seven weeks after that, during Mesmin’s 20-week scan, her doctors advised her to abort her son.
But Mesmin would hear none of it. “I’m not going to give up this baby,” she declared. She decided to forgo any cancer treatment until her son, Thomas, was born.
The only option for treatment then available to Mesmin was having a hysterectomy done, a procedure that would remove her affected cervix and womb removed from her body, immediately after Thomas' birth.
Although it was unprecedented for doctors to perform a hysterectomy immediately after a C-section, they agreed to do so for Mesmin’s specific case.
Thankfully, both procedures went smoothly; Thomas was born easily and the hysterectomy was completed.
Now, Mesmin is well underway in her radiotherapy treatment and is only just realizing, “I don’t think I was scared really during that time. I was always more worried about the baby than for myself.
“I didn’t really realize until after it was all done and Thomas was born that it had been so serious. I don’t talk about my illness, but my friends say they can’t believe I’ve been through all this. It’s just something I have had to deal with.”
Now, 20 months later, Thomas is a happy, healthy boy and Mesmin is close to conquering her disease – for the second time, even
after the growth returned.
The entire Mesmin family – Nicolas, Selina, Hugo, and Thomas – are relieved to finally have the health of their entire family stable and secure, just in time to celebrate their first peaceful holiday season together.
